BOSTON, MA -- Two candidates for the state's highest political office have taken positions highly favorable to father's rights advocates.

Both Independent candidate Barbara Johnson and Libertarian Carla Howell speak plainly and unambiguously about the drastic need to correct the many injustices in the judicial system that face fathers trying to maintain a relationship with their children.

Johnson, an attorney from Andover, has a long history of championing unpopular and politically incorrect causes. Her web site, www.falseallegations.com, contains an encyclopedic collection of cases where fathers have been falsely accused of child abuse.

In an attempt to capture the public's imagination, Johnson has purchased a fire truck in which she intends to drive home her campaign theme: "Douse out the flames of corruption in the court system!"

This Wednesday, Sept. 25, Johnson will drive the fire truck to the Salem Probate & Family Court where, dressed in red in a fireman's helmet, she will formally announce her candidacy for governor. She will also be representing Brian Meuse that day at the court, a father involved in a contentious custody battle.

"I see first-hand people’s rights being violated by the court on a continuous basis. Children are unnecessarily losing a parent every day in each of our family or juvenile courts across the Commonwealth. Fathers are discriminated against in custody and visitation actions. Many parents cannot afford to fight the termination of parental rights in actions brought by the all-powerful DSS. Innocent parents cannot afford to protect themselves in cases involving false accusations of child abuse" she says.

Not one to shy away from contentious language, Johnson asserts that "Men are castrated by the domestic violence statute and guidelines," in reference to the state's notorious Abuse Prevention law, MGL 209A, and the state's equally notorious Child Support Guideline.

"Due process, equal protection, and fundamental fairness must be reborn," she warns.

Her "passion," she says, is to expose the federal Omnibus program. "The bonus incentives given out by the federal government encourage the Commonwealth and its 49 sister States to violate the constitutional rights of people in order to collect hundreds of millions upon millions of dollars every year. I want to know into which or whose pockets that money lands and how it is spent."

On the subject of taxes Johnson treads close to Libertarian Party home turf. Libertarian Carla Howell is equally outraged at the money trough that is used to support the divorce industry. Howell insists that government intervention in marriages and divorce must be minimized. She wants the courts to give full faith and credit to all pre-nuptial and divorce agreements to minimize destructive and costly divorce battles.

Howell's policy statement calls for getting "Big Government" out of marriage and families. "We must end the damage caused by Big Government meddling," she says, "and restore the responsibility of individuals who choose to marry by: strictly obeying the Constitutional rights of all parties involved in a divorce, especially regarding Abuse Prevention Orders (Chapter 209A) [and] fully enforcing private marriage contracts."

Like Johnson, Howell also pulls no punches in attacking the state's "child protection" regimes, notably the DSS. She advocates "repealing and removing all authority and funding of the dangerous and destructive Massachusetts DSS (Dept. of Social Services)," and "severing all ties with the federal government with respect to 'child protection' regulation, funding, or involvement"

Howell also calls for ending child support obligations after the age of eighteen. People are often surprised to learn that in Massachusetts, child support obligations can extend to the age of twenty-three.

To curb the rampant abuse of 209A abuse protection orders in divorce, Howell proposes "legislation that would provide for specific penalties for divorcees and prospective divorcees who make false accusations."

"There must be no exceptions to the right of due process and a fair trial," she says. "In particular, it has become common practice in a divorce case for one party, typically the woman, to accuse the other, typically her soon-to-be ex-husband, of violence in order to get a restraining order against him where there is no prior history of violence, where there is no proof of violence or even a threat, and where no crime is ever charged. These illegitimate restraining orders are used to put him at a disadvantage and allow her to pressure him into conceding her wishes..."

Mark Charalambous
CPF Spokesman
brontis@thecia.net
(978) 840-0268

Barbara Johnson
http://www.barbforgovernor.com/
barbaracjohnson@worldnet.att.net
(978) 474-0833

Carla Howell
http://www.carlahowell.org/
media@carlahowell.org